


A Reading Rainbow

by noctaval



Category: Log Horizon
Genre: Books, Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-12-20
Updated: 2015-12-20
Packaged: 2018-05-07 20:36:41
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,732
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5470079
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/noctaval/pseuds/noctaval
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Shiroe gets more than he bargained for when pulling a research all-nighter.</p>
            </blockquote>





	A Reading Rainbow

**Author's Note:**

  * For [anathomical](https://archiveofourown.org/users/anathomical/gifts).



"I'm so glad you've come back to visit, Shiroe-sama!" Re-gan enthused, clasping his hands together and beaming joyfully at his companion. "I know you were far too busy, before, to make full use of the library and I, I humbly offer, of course, all of my books and scrolls, anything  you desire, let me know, if there's any particular book, especially..." the sage trailed off, sticking his head into a chest of scrolls and sneezing loudly as he rummaged through them.  
  
Shiroe hid behind his glasses, trying not to stare in amazement at the cavernous disarray of Re-gan's library. Shelves stretched floor to ceiling, disappearing into the darkness of the vault above. Books sprouted like mushrooms in stacks and piles, strewn across tables and walling off secluded alcoves. Dim blue magelight and flickering candles illuminated thousands on thousands of titles, from gem-encrusted tomes with gleaming gilt-leaf titles to battered journals streaked with grime and fluttering with half-rotted ribbon bookmarks.  
  
"Thank you very much for sharing your research with me," Shiroe finally responded politely. He trailed his fingers through a layer of dust on the nearest pile, revealing the rough red canvas of the title underneath. _Keep your cool_ , he admonished himself; but Re-gan's glee was infectious, and gazing on the treasure trove of learning surrounding him Shiroe found it nigh impossible to contain his excitement.  
  
"There are so many _books_ ," Shiroe finally burst out, fingers twitching with the desire to lay hands on them and _read them all_.  
  
Re-gan beamed. "Isn't it wonderful! Here, I've found the potions I was looking for," he pushed a glass into Shiroe's hands,"You see, I told you I'd stocked up, and also that scroll I told you about, it's a good place to start, I think, if you're brushing up on elder magics; of course, not at _all_ a complete review of the subject, rather a beginner's spell, but a place to start, if you please, Shiroe-sama," Re-gan finished in one breath, gazing starry-eyed up at Shiroe and pushing the scroll at him as if looking for approval.  
  
Shiroe smiled hesitantly and switched the glass to his other hand to take the scroll, then set the former on the red book as he unrolled the latter. A pile of encyclopediae provided a level surface to spread out the battered vellum and a few empty candlesticks sufficed to weight the corners. With a brief gesture Shiroe summoned a magelight of his own to brighten the surface — that would never get old, he allowed to himself with a tiny grin —and peered down at the scroll.  
  
Tiny script lined almost the entire surface, broken only by a few arcane diagrams of interlocking circles and triangles, themselves bordered by minuscule runes. He brushed the surface, flattening the soft hide and feeling the slightest grain under his fingertips. There was almost an electric chill at the touch — it _was_ a magical scroll, he supposed.  
  
The lettering, he quickly realized, was completely illegible, but whether it was a foreign dialect or simply a highly stylized font he couldn't tell. He bent closer, and found the diagrams swam under his eyes; the longer he stared, the more disoriented he became, until he was forced to look away for the dizziness. _Fascinating_. Perhaps the scroll itself was enchanted against reading, maybe the writing was in some sort of code...  
  
"Well, aren't you going to use it?" Re-gan inquired impatiently from somewhere just behind Shiroe's shoulder, and he startled.  
  
"Eh?"  
  
Still rather uncomfortably close, Re-gan wormed his way around Shiroe to pat the scroll. "Well, you know, it's like a grimoire. You can't read it like a layman's book, you have to use it, you know, activate it with your magic."  
  
Shiroe just stared. _Even now, I still have so much to learn about this world_. "I, ah..."  
  
Re-gan blinked up at him for a moment, mouth hanging open, but then he smiled and saved Shiroe from himself. "Of course, doubtless, the way adventurers do things is quite different!" he replied matter-of-factly, though he gave Shiroe a conspiratorial pat. "Here, like this, put your hand out just above it..."  
  
Re-gan guided Shiroe's hand to the center of the scroll, then continued "...and push your mana out and back in, quick as you please, not even a spell, just a little pulse, there!" The sage demonstrated with a tiny pulse of his own, his hand lighting up briefly, and Shiroe found he couldn't help but follow, the still-strange tickle of magic reaching out, connecting with the book and —  
  
A flash of light, a hundred thousand thousand words, _images_ , leaping into his mind, filling him up like a cup and bursting behind his eyelids, the spinning diagrams of the scroll turning on their edges and he _understood_ , the words of scroll clarified and he remembered them, as if he'd written every one, the knowledge of the spell seeping into his consciousness until he could have given a lecture on its creation and use —  
  
He snapped back to himself as his status menu pinged cheerfully, flashing into sight. [New Spell Learned: Dream Sight! {LVL89 ENC 320MP}]  
  
"Wow," Shiroe breathed, at a loss for words.  
  
Greatly daring, Re-gan actually slapped his back, and Shiroe smirked at him in return. Re-gan spread his arms wide to indicate the entirety of the library, then gave Shiroe a dramatic bow. Pushing his glasses back up his nose, Shiroe rolled up the scroll and tied it neatly, then leapt up and clapped his hands together. This was going to be _fun_.

 

* * *

 

  
The two had lost themselves in a scholarly fervor for what seemed like hours, tossing volumes back and arguing about the applications of the spells Shiroe was seeking. Shiroe "read" several more books and actually read even more, taking notes as he tried to piece together the foundations of a new intelligence system for Akihabara. Each book was an explosion of light and understanding. It was like reading a library in an instant; no, like a entire year of college coursework jammed into a moment's touch. It was intoxicating — even better than normal reading.  
  
Of course, simply training the Round Table mages in far-sight and surveillance magics was probably insufficient to filter out attacks like the ones that had nearly paralyzed the city before; what they needed was a sort of actual intelligence agency to assemble their collective knowledge into actionable plans. What else could be useful...perhaps a sort of magical trap, designed to copy documents carried by the victim, convey them back to the city...?  
  
Re-gan was scolding him for overworking himself, but Shiroe was too excited by his progress to care about pulling another all-nighter. He sipped at a flask of water as he dusted off the shelf before him...oh.  
  
THE COLLECTED WISDOM OF THE NINTH MIRAL SAGE, read the inscription on the brass plate below the set of leather-bound volumes.  
  
"I found it!" he shouted across the room to Re-gan, hauling the first volume off the shelf and turning to the centermost page as Re-gan had showed him."  
  
"You're going to make yourself sick!" Re-gan hollered back, the sound of tumbling books following him, but Shiroe just rolled his eyes and read the book, filing away the information once he'd recovered, stars of knowledge blinking behind his eyes. He swayed a little in exhaustion but steeled himself and reached for the next volume, two of nineteen, swimming in illuminated arcana as the contents of a life's work sorted itself into his brain. He kept working, pausing occasionally to make notes before diving back in.  
  
Somewhere around the fifth book — or was it the sixth?— he started to feel very strange. When he went to put back the volume he'd just finished, his fingers went numb and the heavy grimoire tumbled from his hands. He stared at it a moment from above, but when he bent over to pick it up he staggered and fell against the bookshelf, the room spinning around him. The dim lights were much too bright, the dusty air choking, the scratching of Re-gan's pen unbearably loud.  
  
Shiroe looked down at himself and found his body had begun to glow: a soft sickly lavender that outlined his hands and arms and hazed his face. "Re-gan?" he called out, alarmed.  
  
A cacophonous clatter pierced his ears; Re-gan must have dropped his pen. "Oh, now you've done it," the sage sighed. Shiroe turned to see him making his way across the stacks.  
  
"Done what—" Shiroe started to ask, but before he could get the second word out he was bent over his hands and knees in agony. His magic was in flux — and wasn't that a novel, _awful_ feeling —and it surged uselessly without the focus of a spell as he retched dryly.  
  
"There, there— just let it out," Re-gan soothed, patting his shoulder gently as he reached Shiroe's side.  
  
_Oh great_ , Shiroe thought, _I'm going to be sick in front of someone who thinks I'm an_ archmage.  
  
A surge of nausea swept through him and Shiroe shut his eyes, chest heaving and...dripping?  
  
Shiroe opened his eyes to find himself covered in a thick layer of purple slime, dripping from him like a cold sweat. Oily and luminous, the bizarre substance crawled away from him with every wave of nausea. Bizarrely, under the surface of the clear substance seemed to swim...words?  
  
They were unreadable, but seemed oddly familiar. Strands of text even seemed to float away from the surface of the puddling liquid, but Shiroe didn't fully understand until he saw the curving lines of a spell diagram reflecting from the discharge pooled between his hands.  
  
_Oh_.  
  
More of the grimoire purged from him with each queasy wave, and he finally began to feel better, standing weakly and swiping at the glistening slime on his jacket sleeve as fragments of letters fluttered off into the dust.  
  
Re-gan popped back into view with a push-broom, sweeping ineffectually at the word-puddles that spilled over the floor and rose from the ground as if to escape. Shiroe flushed and opened his mouth to apologize, but Re-gan waved him away.  
  
"I haven't seen anyone get that sick since my university days!" he confided cheerfully, corralling the bookslime into a battered bucket.  
  
Shiroe gave him a wan smile and slumped into a dusty armchair, shutting his eyes with a grimace.  
  
_...Did I just get drunk on books?_


End file.
